Monday, August 30, 2010

Coal Gasification Safe and Affordable Energy for Future

Gasification, as opposed to combustion, is the most thermally efficient and cleanest way to convert the energy content of coal into electricity, hydrogen, clean fuels, and value-added chemicals. The product of gasification the syngasis a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. Sulfur, however, has to be removed from the mixture in the form of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and carbonyl sulfide (COS) to protect process equipment and meet environmental regulations.

The T-2749 Fluidized-bed Desulfurization Sorbent, developed by Santosh Gangwal, Raghubir Gupta, and Brian Turk of RTI International, Research Triangle Park, N.C., is a regenerable desulfurization sorbent used inside a transport reactor that allows sulfur to be removed to equilibrium levels in temperatures between 500 and 1000°F. Due to its improvements of the gasification process, the T-2749 allows for the gasification process to be environmentally safe and affordable. _R&DMag

Gasification is a process through which carbon-based materials such as coal, petroleum coke, and biomass are converted into syngas that can be used to efficiently produce clean electricity, transportation fuels, and chemicals using domestic fuel resources. Cost-effective syngas clean-up technology is a key to achieving near-zero emissions from gasification-based power generation and chemical plants. Additionally, gasification-based systems provide the lowest cost option for capturing and sequestering carbon dioxide from coal use.

The project includes the pre-front-end-engineering-design phase, during which Shaw will conduct a study for a 50-megawatt commercial demonstration unit to be built at Tampa Electric Company's 250-megawatt integrated gasification combined cycle power plant in Florida.
"This 50 megawatt scale-up will mitigate the remaining technical risks before full commercial deployment," said David Myers, vice president of the Engineering and Technology Unit at RTI. "Beyond application in the power industry, the technology also holds tremendous potential to reduce the cost of producing hydrogen, chemicals such as methanol and ammonia, and fuels through gasification of coal or other low-value carbonaceous feedstocks, while enabling carbon capture through conventional or advanced CO2 removal technologies."

Traditional methods require warm syngas to be cooled before the gas cleanup process begins. The new technology, which eliminates the need for syngas cooling and expensive heat recovery systems, is expected to significantly reduce the capital and operating costs of an integrated gasification combined cycle power plant. _RTISyngasCleaning

Carbon hysteria is perhaps the most dangerous mental disorder haunting the minds of persons in government, academia, media, and faux environmental organisations such as Greenpeace, Sierra Club, WWF, etc. Coal is perhaps the most hated repository of energy in the world, perhaps even including uranium and plutonium. This coal-phobia will prove extremely hazardous to the future of humanity, if the energy starvation policies of US and European governments continue to dominate the political stage of the advanced world.

Energy starvation is but one step in a progressive program to reduce the human population of the planet. (see Dieoff.orgy and Voluntary Human Extinction Mooment;-) You don't need to be intelligent to destroy the planet while claiming to be saving it. You only need to be in a position of power and have the sympathies of 95% of global media, academia, and media oriented special interests.